The Last Chapters of Ptolemy's Gate
by Waifine
Summary: [[WARNING: This is a spoiler for book three!]] All had taken Nathanial for dead. How very wrong they were...
1. Chapter 40 :Nathanial:

**Nathanial **

**40**

Nathanial let out a groan. Something immensity heavy was pressing down upon his chest. He blinked. His vision was blurred and there was a sharp throbbing in his head. It took him minutes to take in that a large metal bar was pinning him to the ground. He could only see earth and sky because his head was had been pressed down on his cheek. He seemed to have twisted under the bar, and when he tried to move his hip a stinging pain wracked through him. Thus, he looked out at the world twixt bar and ground. How had he come to be here? His tried to clear the fog that was drifting before him eyes and within his mind. In a flash he remembered everything. Kitty, the Staff, Nouda, Bartimaeus. Nathaniel let out a sigh which, moments later, sent a sharp pain tingling though him. He could not look down but he could feel the blood poring freely from his side. His head was light. Nathaniel tried to move the bar off of himself but his body – beaten as it was – merely collapsed.

Now that he thought about it…why was he alive at all? Why hadn't the Staff over powered him and blasted him to smithereens? Why hadn't more of the Glass Place fallen on top of him and crushed him? Why, despite all laws of nature, was he alive?

_The blast from the Staff must have thrown me back so that only the edge of the Glass Place's foundation fell on me. Still…the odds which were on my side…I ought to be dead. Incinerated. Squashed._

Nathanial tried once again to pull free of the beam, with just as little successes as before. His hands shook as he braced them against his iron keeper. He cursed his weakness. It was more evident now than ever, when only a short while before the djinn had made his veins pulse with energy. There was no one nearby to ask for help. The aria seemed to have been evacuated.

Nathanial who had lifted his face a little to try and get a view of his surroundings, let his head fall back onto the ground, looking up at the sky above, obscured as it was by smoke of the still smoldering Palace. He was going to die here. After all he'd lived through he was going to die stuck under a useless piece of scrap metal. Nathanial though of his drawing teacher – Ms. Lutyens. Would she ever think of him with anything but contempt? Of Bartimaeus. Despite their constant bickering he had almost come to regard the demon as a friend. And Kitty. Perhaps the only person who had ever l– Nathanial's eyes widened, and a pang of fear went through him.

Had she escaped? Bartimaeus had said she would, but was the Amulet strong enough? Or had she, like himself, been knocked over and pinned down by some piece of metal? Had the glass from the millions of windowpanes cut her to shreds? Nathanial's brain whirled with panic and with loss of blood. With a last heave he tried to budge the colossal wait off of himself. Perhaps it had been the sudden torrent of panic that had flooded him; perhaps some of Bartimaeus's power of physical strength had remand within his body. Whatever it was only one thing was a fact. The beam had moved.

Nathanial worked ceaselessly for the rest of the day. He was like a mad man, fueled by indescribable strength. There was so much to get done. There were so many people he had yet co confront. He figures, now covered with blood and mud pried into the iron that held him against the ground. _Kitty._ As the sun was setting over the destroyed rooftops in the west Nathanial gave a small sigh of victory and scraped the last stip of his pant leg out from under his iron prison.

Hunger was clawing at his stomach and his head was dizzy from loss of blood. He was also suddenly over come by the new waive of exhausting for that sudden burst of energy he had had. Also, Place foundations hadn't left him completely sound. Nathanial felt pain searing in his knee and in his rib cage. Possible breakings.

After laying where he was for maybe another hour Nathanial felt a minimal amount of his energy return to him. But what he really needed was food. Heaven only knew how long he had been unconscious, and how much longer then he had been imprisoned by the confusticated beam.

He looked up at the molten, twisted mound of scrap metal which, not long before, had been the Glass Palace. Nathanial had been right in guessing that he had been thrown back to its perimeter. He was sure that some of the fast food stalls, which had stood within the Place, had been full up on food. But he was not about to go crawling about with serious injuries in twisted metal, which was still steaming from the magical blast it had received who knew how many days ago.

Nathanial rasped for air. His head pulsed. He looked about for some sort of a walking stick, something which he could use to lean his weight on while he tried to reach civilization – if there was any left in London. As he cast his gaze about, a long pieces of knobbed wood caught his eye. He could not believe it. It was the Staff. With a great deal of difficulty Nathanial dragged himself over to where it lay. Sure as could be, there lay Gladstone's Staff. Powerless now. But as Nathanial ran his fingers along its gnarled surface he couldn't help feeling the relief of familiarity wash over him.

With some difficulty Nathanial dragged the staff over to the burnt skeleton of a tree. The moment he tried to stand up pain wracked though him again. He, however, clenched his teeth and eased the Staff under his arm like a crutch. His insides were positively screaming with pain. Once he was certain that he would not collapse under his first step – a task, which in itself, took no less than twenty minutes – Nathanial made his first step. He found himself no longer at the Palaces sight at all. He looked down at his feet, and saw the seven league boots.

He grinned. Within another two steps Nathanial had reached the barricades which blocked the dead zone. With a sigh of relief Nathanial pushed one out of the way with a shaky hand and slipped through. _Finally, civilization. _

Where should he go first? He looked around himself. The street was deserted. The pain in his body was now coming in sharp pulses. His house. He had to get to his house.

Nathanial turned in the direction he needed and, after another three steps, arrived at his front door. The pain in his side was burning into him. Very few of the windows were lit. But to his surprise Nathanial saw, in one of the windows, two forms behind the curtain.

Nathaniel did not want to crash into his own wall upon his next step, so, groaning with pain, he relived himself of the boots. With great difficulty Nathanial managed it up the steps leading to his door. The door, also to his surprise, was open. The second Nathanial entered the foyer he heard angry voices from his study. Staff under arm, boots in hand, his face set against the pain, Nathanial made his way to his work room.

"Listen to me commoner! There is much suspicion that Mr. Mandrake had great desire to overtake England itself! His last act with the Staff was the act of a mad megalomaniac! His possessions must be searched. And the Amulet, which he stole from the government, returned!"

"And I tell you Nathanial was not a traitor! He gave his life to save England! And now when I look at stuck up, prissy, and totally ignorant magicians like you I can't understand his reasons for doing as much! As for the Amulet, he gave it to me and I plan to keep it! Take it from me if you can but if Nathanial were here he'd –"

"–Ask everyone to stop shouting. This is an office! Not your commoner football stadium!" Before the wolf who had met him at the door could introduce him, Nathanial had hobbled into the room as best he could.

Both Ms. Farrar and Kitty looked as if they'd seen a ghost. But Nathanial did not give too much for their goggling. His knees were about to give way again, "Look, could someone please help me into my chair?" he said, his teath gritted and his face set into a grimace.

Without a word Kitty walked across the room to him in three brisk steps. She took the arm which was not supported by the Staff and, with a swift and strong motion, pulled it around her shoulder. The room was silent accept for the 'clunking' of Gladstone's Staff as Kitty helped Nathanial to his executive chair. It was still positioned behind his large, oak desk, as if it were waiting for him. With a sigh, Nathanial collapsed into it and set his boots down next to him. "Now then, what's all this about searching my possessions? And more importantly, how long has it been?" His voice came out in a coke, but it still held the arrogance and authority it had when he had been John Mandrake.

Both women seemed tongue tied. Ms. Farrar finally found words to speak, her eyes gleaming with hatred and shock, "Three days Mandrake. Where have you been in that time? The country in the middle of a crisis and you vanish at the heart of it! Explain yourself."

Nathanial sighed, all too aware of Kitty's gaze boring into him. He put his hand up and rubbed the bridge of his nose. "In the last three days since the demon attack I have been trapped under one of the iron beams which were the body of the Glass Palace."

Kitty flinched and then, for the first time, spoke to him. Her voice was shaking, "B–but I was only there yesterday. I'd have seen you."

Nathanial shook his head, "The beam had covered most of my body. No more than an arm and a leg were protruding from under it. Unless subjected to very close inspection, I would have remained completely unnoticed…" His head gave a particularly painful throb. He felt dizzy from exhortation and loss of blood. At least Kitty was safe… "Now, if you two ladies wouldn't mind, I haven't eaten since the morning of the play, my body is in a condition I never believed possible to drive it to. All in all, if anyone could please escort me to a hospital I'd be–" He was cut short by Kitty hurrying to stand next to him, calling for his secretary and the two of them taking him under the arms and half walking, have dragging him to my car.

As Nathanial passed Ms. Farrar on his way out of the office their eyes met, "Well Mandrake, you really have sunken in society. From demons to commoners. Will you be taking in farms animals as life long companions next?"

"I'd prefer to live the rest of my life with a dog rather than in the company of you or your wolves," Nathanial spat back. He wasn't prone to such sharp remarks but he couldn't have restrained himself then even if he'd had the energy to try. Ms. Farrar had insulted the few things that were of importance to him right to his face.

Four more days after he'd gotten to the hospital – a weak since the demon attack – Nathanial lay in a comfortable hospital bed. He had a brace around his chest due to his four broken ribs; a cast on his leg because of the shattered kneecap and countless bandaging on his side, which had been partly blown off because of the detonator.

So, when Kitty was finally allowed to visit him that morning he was thoroughly ashamed of his appearance – a feeling which did not improve with the mixed look of shock and horror on her face when she saw him.

There was an awkward pause, then, "So…you came back," not once did she take her eyes off of him. Nathanial noticed they were red. Had she been crying?

With some difficulty, he nodded, "As I promised."

She was silent for a moment, "As you promised," she echoed.

"Look um…" Nathanial looked away from her, his eyes searching for something with which to change the subject and break the odd silence that had settled in upon them. "Would you like some of these sweets? My secretary sent them to me but to be honest I don't like sweets." He wrinkled his nose a little. _Candy._ He had started a conversation about _candy._

"No thanks," she attempted a smile, "I'm getting my hair dyed next week," Kitty tossed a graying lock out of her face.

Nathanial could only nod numbly, "That's nice." Again, silence, "How's everyone taking my reincarnation," he smiled ruefully.

Kitty shook her head, "Not very well I'm afraid. That cow, Farrar's, just screaming that you're a look alike. I was coming a bit close to slapping her but Mr. Buttons stopped me," she scowled.

Nathanial smirked, "I'm sure Bartimaeus would have approved."

Kitty's face fell a little. "Er…speaking of which, is he, I mean did he…?"

"I dismissed him moments before the Staff was released," Nathanial answered wearily. "He was a bungler and I wanted all to be done properly… It was nothing personal," he added sharply, seeing the grin that was fast spreading across Kitty's face.

"Sure it wasn't," she smirked and came to sit down by his bed. The two talked for a while longer. Nathanial allowed his head to sink into his pillow, his muscles relaxed. When was the last time had had done this? Had a normal conversation with no strings attached?

But at one point Kitty checked her watch. "Well, I have to go. But I'll be back again this evening," and then she did something she had never done before. She leaned over Nathanial, bent down, and kissed him on the cheek.

It had maybe been another ten minutes – by which time Kitty had left – that the blush began to subside.


	2. Chapter 41 :Bartimaeus:

**Bartimaeus**

**41**

Ok, so I could tell that it hadn't been such a short time since I'd last been summoned, but by the ache in my essence it hadn't been particularly long ether. It's odd, but as I was wisped away from the Other Place I felt a slight pang of guilt and annoyance within me. Nathanial was dead. Dead as a door nail. And what happens? What does Bartimaeus do? He goes off to serve another master. This was my curse. And with Nathanial dead, I felt as if Ptolemy's dream had died again.

As I made my way to my new master – whoever he was to be, or she – a thought struck me. It would be my way of honoring Nathanial. Despite what a brat he'd been he had dismissed me to save my life, and died.

So, as I began to materialize in the pentacle I decided on what form to wear. His. Now, Nathanial's form alone would not have struck fear in the most pathetic of imps. But as _my_ form began to appear a howling wind picked up. Blue electric bolts shot along the floor. A dark shape could be distinguished in the fog, his black cloak billowing in the wind, his hair – I'd made it a bit longer than his army cru cut had been, just for the effect – was tossing about as the torrent of whirling air circled around him. If Nathanial could only have seen himself – or rather me – now… it would make his ego sky rocket to the next dimension. The idea that I, Bartimaeus, Sakhr al-Jinni, N'gorso the Mightly and the Serpent of Silver Plumes, was honoring him, a human, in such a way was beyond imaginable! In his hands the cloaked figure held the dreaded, the all powerful, the great Gladstone's St –

"Is that really how you imagine me?" a voice with amusement and amazement mixed together leaked through the howling wind. I had kept my head lowered, planning to snap it up and give my new master such piercing a glaze that it would knock him straight out of his pentacle. Instead of the dramatic effect I had desired, the wind made a sound as if it were being sucked out of the room by a vacuum, the hair which had been going up like static came down to flop in front of my eyes and obscure my vision, and the Staff in my hand lost a few of it's knobbles, almost as if it were deflating.

I swept the strands of hair away, in too much shock to believe what I was seeing. "YOU!!!" I gagged, looking across the room to the figure lying on the couch. "You're supposed to be dead!" I couldn't believe it. Did _nothing_ kill him? Sure, he looked a bit scratched up: A cast here, a brace there, a lot of bandages there again, a crutch. But really! There he was. Nathanial. To all intents and purposes he was very much alive.

"It seems you're as shocked as I was," a small smirk was sitting on my old master's face. "So tell me, is that _really_ how you imagine me?"

I growled. He'd really gotten me this time. That brat would be smirking about this for the rest of his life. And lets face it. If I had walked in on my funeral just as he was delivering a speech about my greatness of character, by boldness of temperament, and all the other things which he came to learn about through our overly long acquaintance, I would have probably eaten him in my glee.

"Not quite, I got the proportions wrong." Within seconds, I went from the great magician I'd appeared as**O** into a less handsome figure. I'd stretched out his nose, lengthened his hair to just how long it had been when he was fourteen, and gave him a nice pot belly. "There we g–" I stopped in mid-sentence. For the first time I'd noticed that Nathanial was not in a pentacle, he was just lying on a couch. Nathanial had no protection.

"So…you really do trust me then don't you?" the overly long nose shortened a bit. I looked him up and down – or rather, seeing as he was lying down – left to right. "You're a mess. I mean, you never were much to look at but now you look perfectly horrible. I shudder to think what Kitty thought when _she_ first saw you again!"

Defiantly not my imagination. The boy had gone red on the cheek bones. I gave him a sly grin, "Ooh! Pray tell! What _has _been going on in my absence?" In an instant I was by the couch, "Budge up there, make room." I lifted his feet up rather unceremoniously, to which he let out a loud groan. What a baby he really was.

"Do you mind?! I'm in pain here!"

"Ya, ya, ya. Deal. Incidentally, how did you live though that?" I sat down at the other end of the couch and dumped his feet onto the floor.

He grimaced. "The staff blasted me back so that only a part of the Palace fell in me."

"I see...well, glad I wasn't there!"**OO**

He glared at me, "Well, if it comes down to that, so am I! You would have messed everything up! It would have been catastrophic!"

"You're acting as if I'm the one who always messes things up! When we were back in Prague, who walked strait into that little square where the ambush was waiting? Who walked right up to Loveless and told him about who'd really stolen the Amulet? Who–"

"Will you ever shut up!?" Nathanial wasn't looking to good. He was using up too much of his strength to yell at me. Typical of him.

"I'll punch you in another minute," I said lazily. I didn't think swallowing him would be very fare, seeing as he was down and all. Besides, a punch would be a nice inauguration of our reacquaintance. At least, that was my thought.

"Go ahead! Hit me while I'm down! I wouldn't put it past you!" Now _this_ was going a bit far.

I grabbed Nathanial by the front of his shirt and dragged him up to my eye level. He turned even greener. Anyone coming into the room at this moment would have seen one rather fat and disfigured Nathanial – yours truly – facing a very green, much to skinny, impudent, cripple, useless Nathanial. "Say that again," I hissed, inches away from his face.

"You two are impossible!" said a voice – poring with exasperation, anger, and dare I say, perhaps a touch of amusement in it – from the door. I turned around dragging Nathanial with me.

"Hello Kitty, long time no see."

"Put him down Bartimaeus. On the couch. Without injury."

"Is that a request or a command?"

"It's a command, and would be if it was Nathanial choking you instead of vise versa."

I turned back to my former master and, none to gently mind, pushed him back onto the couch. That last remark had stung a bit. But I knew how to get right back at him. Ooh, this was going to be fun!

Turning to Kitty I said, "Oh, by the way, did he tell you that in what were to be his dieing moments he thought of nothing but you?" I'd done it. Nathanial's face went as red as a cherry. In a whoosh of air my pot belly vanished. I was dressed in the dress clothes Nathanial had attended the opera in. I was dirty, bloodily and, indeed, the spitting image of how Nathanial had looked the night of the attack. Holding my Gladstone Staff up against an imaginary enemy I adopted his voice, _"Say hi to Kitty for me." _With that I twirled the Staff in my hand like a bottom and it vanished into thin air. I myself then changed – my – Nat's clothes into jeans and a t-shirt, and I lengthened his hair a little. **OOO**

"It was actually quite touching. I mean, there we were, the enemy bearing down upon us. Death moments away, but did my master waver? Never! His thoughts of you drove him on!" Ah, she was starting to blush too now. I was pleased. With a smug grin on my face I got up from the couch and sat myself down in an arm chair across the room. We were in Nathanial's office.

"How long's it been since your death?" I asked, _but only_ when the very awkward silence had fully sunken in.

"Er…three weeks," Nathanial muttered faintly, not looking up at Kitty. She, on the other hand, couldn't tare her eyes away from him. I'd done well.

"And?" I asked pointedly, slumping in the arm chair a little and putting my arms behind my head. "Why'd you summon me back. My essence isn't doing to well you know."

Nathanial took a deep breath. It was odd, but for a moment the bugger seemed as if he really didn't know what to do with himself. It was a queer situation to see him in. I mean, here he was, the great John Mandrake, alive and – relatively – well, and looking thoroughly wrong footed.

"I need to get out of here," he finally said wearily.

In all honesty, this statement took a few minutes to sink in. "Waaaait a second," extending my legs forward to make myself more comfortable. "You don't mean…I mean…You're not talking about…" I quirked an eyebrow at him. "England?"

I have to say that the guy looked as if the death sentence had been proclaimed upon him. "Too many people know my name here. I have to flee."

My jaw dropped a little. "But Nat… what about…ya know…the lot of it." I waived my hand around the room vaguely. Everything he had ever fought for. Everything that had ever fueled him.

"None existent," Nathanial replied curtly. "You forget demon, when the wizard supremacy fell, I fell with them. I intend to go to the continent. Kitty…" the blush had not entirely left his face, "She will stay on. Then," here he smirked at me. I knew that smirk it was the: _I've-got-a-really-bad-plan-that-involves-you-risking-your-essence _look and the same one which he always tried to pass off as the _I'm-so-brilliant-and-great-and-out-of-this-world-look._ Ya, I knew it well enough. "If I can, I might retune under a new identity. My days of full government have passed. But I believe that I might still be of some service from the sidelines."

"Once a politician, always a politician, eh? Natt."

Nathanial ignored my comment about his name. But then again, what was the point of fretting over it now if what he said was true. "Will you help me get out? Disguise myself? And return?"

It took me a few blinks of the human eye to figure out what he had said. He was _asking_ me if I _wanted _to help What was this? April Fools Day? But when I looked up at him I could see that he was being quite honest. I suppose that it was a bit of an oxymoron to see honesty coming from him. But then, he had changed beyond recognition. For one thing he had almost become bearable to be around. I smirked, and hoisted myself out of the chair. Extending a hand for him to shake I said in the most solemn voice I could – just to give it that extra spice. You know, so that I could look back like at a really good soap opera – "Be glad to Nat." We – the two Nathanials – clasped hands, and it was almost as if our minds were still one.

---

**O** Note that I took quite a bit or poetic license with my Nathanial. For one thing, I made him look handsome.

**OO** This wasn't entirely true. It had been one of those rare occasions – the second one in my life as a mater of fact – that I'd ever wanted to stand and fight to the death.

**OOO** Note that I say 'a little.' I don't go to extremes as he does. It's either 'long-and-greasy,' for him or 'army cru cut.' The kid just has no idea what to do with himself. He's a lost cause.


End file.
